An Inch of Daylight
by Caleigho Meer
Summary: The Joker and Harvey compare scars. Possible continuation
1. Chapter 1

He didn't know if it was God's cruel joke, or karma kicking his ass as he stared, quietly at the bars of the cell, and wondered what the hell went so wrong to land him here. Bright slants of sunlight, mutilated by the shadows fragmented over the floor, as he squinted. Wincing, he felt the scars tug at muscles as he abscently scrubbed a hand over a cheek, and then through his tangled curls. He supposed he looked little more than a monkey in a zoo picking at a flea. From the way the attack dogs they called prison guards were posed and eagerly smacking their little night sticks against their palms in challenge...he knew they would need no provocation to bring him down and beat the piss out of him. He gave one a coy grin, licked his lips for good measure, and wagged a finger. "Big sticks,boys. Compensating for something"  
He wagged an eyebrow with a leer. The attack dog nearest him whirled, clubbed his hand with a loud clang, and a satisfied snirk at the sounds of bones splintering. The Joker yelped at the pain, cradled the busted hand to his side, eyed it with a sneer. "Good aim." He chuckled. "Very, very nice indeed." The flesh had literally been smashed to a pulp, already wilted and purple from the blow, and he knew every bone between the wrist and the knuckles was nothing more than useless mush.

It mattered little, though. The pain was just one more reminder of his current predicament.Hours had crawled by, time seemed to slow from the sheer burden of thought, and then, the choking realization that they were literally, finally going to wring his neck. His hands swirled over his throat, and he chuckled in perverse amusement at the ironic play on words. It seemed as if the joke was finally on him, and he could not help the cackle. Apparently the sound of laughter was either aggitating or unnerving to his sullen guards. One flinched, another stared, yet another, the one who had broken his hand, only clubbed the bars again, barked an order for the 'freak to shut the hell up before he came in there and broke his jaw, too."

The Joker only raised an eyebrow, in mocking fear, as he feined a tremble, siddled up to the bars, and whispered,one finger lacing over the cracked corner of his mouth, "And do you think that damn stick of yours can possibly do any more damage to my face than what's already been done, meathead? Go ahead. Whack me senseless.Club out what brains I have left."

He waved an arm in invitation, spread arms wide in welcome. "I'm lonely. Won't you come...play?" It was a hideous purr, and it clearly unnerved the already tense guards. He was suprised that none of them pissed their pants when he glided away from the cell door, after the guard lurched forward, inches away, and only glared at him, with a snarl. The Joker shook his head, mutely sat back on the bench in the middle of the cell. It was boring, and he was already irked that they didn't at least give a condemned man a last meal, a play thing...some sort of send off. He wondered if there were fireworks in hell as he idly drummed fingers against the metal bench. He smirked at the loud clang, and the startled cringe of the guards from the unexpected noise. The guard that broke his hand..honestly, he looked more like a pitbull in a uniform than a man! whirled to face him, the club smacking his palm in hideous promise as the other guards smirked and one unlocked the cell door.

'So, you're bored? Is that the problem?" The guard snickered. "Maybe ya need a bit of entertainment to liven things up,eh, boys?"

The Joker felt his gut clench in warning as the merry chuckles of perverse mirth fell around him like breaking glass. Eyes squinting into the darkness around the haloed light, he only shrugged. "I don't get the joke." And then he cackled.

"Ya got a visitor,freak. One who has a lot in common with ya. You two should be bosom buddies before the nights over with.  
if ya live that long. Bring him in, boys."

The Joker's scars winked even darker. He rose, warily, clapped his hands in slow, unwavering stacatto. "Oooh, goodie, a toy! I love toys!" He cooed as he heard the sound of sliding chains and shuffling footsteps. He squinted to see the figures moving in the dark, less than ten feet away from his cell.  
There was little to see except the golden mop of hair, over the face that was bowed to the floor, and the strange, majestic stride that seemed perversely out of place for the figure in the blue jumpsuit. The figure said nothing, only waited in resigned silence for the guard to unlock the cell.

The Joker's mocking words froze in his throat when he saw that bowed head suddenly shoot up from the darkness with a jerk.  
"Harvey...Dent?" The Joker fumbled in disbelief for a long moment as the eerie, dark chuckle exploded in sickening glee,  
as Harvey shook his head with the tremors of laughter and some other emotion the Joker could not place.  
"Not any more." Harvey hissed as he slowly raised icy eyes seering with hatred and tilted his head so that the Joker could see at last.

'What the hell' The Joker could only breathe at the naked bone, the charred remains of flesh that clung to one side of his face in one neat line, the cerilian eye the only trace of the man that Harvey used to be. It was peering into the face of a corpse. Harvey turned his face, the human side, and the Joker could only gape as the features twisted in anguish for a brief moment, before Harvey only chuckled again.

"And I thought my face was bad. What happened...did you get drunk and stupid with a blow torch?"

The Joker felt the explosion of a fist against his own face, felt the spit flying from the bared teeth, felt himself being hauled off the floor, and slammed into the bars with a bone-jarring thud. He tasted his blood, hot and wet on his lips,warily siddled away, and gave them all a leer. He heard the steady thump of nightsticks over flesh, Harvey's grunts from the blows and then that feral snarl as Harvey was eventually subdued and left to bleed a few feet away from the Joker.

Heaving, Harvey planted himself into a resigned flop on the metal plank that served as a bench, turned to the Joker with a smirk. "And what do you think your face is going to look like in hell, clown?" The mask had twisted itself, the human side of Harvey's face scowling, the other side nothing but a cadavarous grin.

The Joker stared at his hands for a long moment, lip curling in distaste at the sight of his blood-sullied fingers, and then the nasty, sticky gore adorning his throbbing nose. He had felt the bone splinter and was fairly certain it was broken.  
"Do you think it will be hot enough to pop popcorn, Dent? Or will they just put a stick through us and roast us like little weenies? Curious thought, hmmm?" His fingers resumed their drumming clang against his own bench as he crossed non-chalant arms, and stared at Dent, with a sullen, bored glare. "Seriously, though...what the hell happened to you?"

There was no answer but a growled hiss, as Dent flung a hand up, dug it in frustration through what was left of his thatch of golden hair. Indifferently, he peered over at the Joker's tousled, greasy curls, and recoiled.His fingers flinched at the feel of his open bones, lingered before they curled into a fist that he lay sedately in his lap. Sighing, he stared skyward, took in the metallic gleam of halogen lights that hummed down so loud...Of all the places in the world, of all the thugs he put away over the years...Numbly, he took in the cage he was now living in, the frail scrap of blanket, the slab of concrete floor. He shivered in misery.

He heard the soft, understanding grunt behind him, as Dent's head snapped up, pissed and oddly violated from the Joker's unwanted observation of his mini-nervous breakdown. He saw the Joker's lithe form gliding in the shadows as he lowered himself to the bars between them, lowered himself to the floor, cupped his chin in one hand, languidly waved the other in the air.

"Maybe the more accurate question would be what broke you, hmmm?"

Dent's eyes turned to ice and narrowed even more, as the Joker quirked his shoulders in a little shrug. "See, I'm not head-doc, and I don't have a PH.D behind my name. All I have is the scars." The last word was almost purred as the Joker pointedly ran one finger over the crevice adorning his mouth,tongue darting out to lace saliva over his lips.

Dent shivered in disgust. The Joker only chuckled again in perverse mirth. "You have no idea how dry they get.And...what, do ou expect me to carry lip gloss?!"

Dent quirked an eyebrow, as the Joker went silent again, his storm dark eyes glittering with some emotion he could not name.  
"I guess not." The words were heavy as Dent tilted his head to see the latice work that was laced over the Joker's face with undisguised curiousity.

The Joker flared hands over his cheeks with a mockingly debonaire swirl. "Take a picture while you're at it.It may just last longer."

Dent said nothing, only stared at them, hard,his eyes far away and almost sad as he leaned closer for a better look. The Joker obligingly slid cheeks into the light. Dent warily noted the calculating glint of the Joker's eyes as he, too, ventured a bit closer to take in the gleam of bone and smouldered flesh that clung to the half of Dent's face. Face scrunching up as if he had eaten something distasteful, the Joker shudddered, puncuated the cruel reaction with a theatrical, "EWWW!"

Dent only snorted. "And you really think that hack-job over your face is any better?"

The Joker only offered an indifferent shrug. "It doesn't matter. They're not going away, for you, or me, and you know I'm not just talking about cruelty's handiwork, either."

Dent snorted. "And what happened to you? Did you get drunk with a knife,or is that possibly the worst tattoo job in the world?"

The Joker's eyes went from merry, easy black to glittering obsidion and dark promise in one hidious moment. Hissing a barking, sick, little laugh, the Joker rose to his full height, clutched the bars between betrayingly white knuckles. Dent felt a chill that did not come from any room temperature as the Joker only stared at him for a long,long moment. He looked more like a demon than a human with those scars and those teeth glistening from his bleeding mouth. There was no sound but Dent's hitched breathing,as the Joker's eyes went cold and narrow as a knifepoint.

"The other guy wound up in pieces." Dent's eyebrows arched downward in confusion, as the Joker smiled slowly, ran fingers over the mutilated flesh. "My first kill." He explained, with a shrug, as Dent's mouth fell open and hung there.

The Joker leaned back against the wall, casually, as if they were having little more than a normal chat. "What,would you feel better if I let somebody who does this to somebody else go?"

Dent could only shrug, and breathe out, "How?"

For one moment, the Joker's hand unwillingly ventured up, ghosted over his cheek, lingered there. His dark eyes looked only sad and lost, and Dent saw the shattered remnant of broken humanity before the Joker choked it back down with curled lips and a hand waved in dismissal.

"It was my first kill...the one that I remember the most. The one out of all of them...that actually deserved it. I used to be...a good boy. Quiet.A bookworm, nerdy and polite and all-around sweet, obedient little sheep.Fresh meat for the jocks, too intimidated by the snotty high school girls to even talk to them. Hell, I was either ignorned or roughed up. Not a pleasant existance, but highschool taught me more about depravity than any stint in prison." The Joker snorted, the brutal chuckle breaking from his lips as his shoulders hitched up in a shrug.

"So it went on that way..for years.See, back then, I was naive enough to believe that it was me who had the problem.It was me that deserved the beatings, it was...me...who deserved to have that meathead of a jock make my life a living hell for no other reason other than..he could." Dent noticed the chill that had risen again from the Joker's words, the way his fists clenched into his lap, in helpless, furious little knots. The snarl errupted into a sadistic smirk, as he scraped the curls away from his forehead. "So, one day, meathead and a few of his cronies thinks it might be funny to follow me home,right? Only, that night, they wanted to see if they could make me squeal like a stuck pig." Dent flinched at the reference. The Joker smirked, wryly.

"So, they surround me, right? Rough me up, a few punches, a few bruises, break my glasses...typical high school assault, right? Or, it should have been, until the head meathead pulls a knife, and yanks it to my throat. Spits in my ear that I was making eyes at his girl, some stupid bullshit, I don't remember. That freaks the cronies out. Apparently, it just upped the anty enough to scare them shitless, and they're panicking, and pleading for him to put the damn blade down, while I'm squirming, and screaming and pleading for him not to cut me. Promised him the moon, and the stars, whatever else he wanted, if he just...let me go. That's not good enough, though. My screaming freaks him out. He's in the middle of an alleyway, holding a freaked out little screamer whose bawling loud enough to wake the dead. His friends hotfoot it away, they don't want to be around when Meathead really snaps. Meathead jabs the blade in my mouth, threatens to cut my throat out if I don't shut the hell up, tells me he's gonna cut me open from neck to nuts without so much as a prayer if I don't stop the noise. Then he smiles, this eerie little smirk. Tells me that he's thought about it, and decided that he's tired of seeing me never smile.  
And then..."

The Joker's words halted as Dent exhaled, the tension in the room fraying like a noose,before the body drops. Dent's eyes widen to see the brief glitter of what looks like tears in the Joker's eyes for a brief moment before that splintered mouth pulls itself into a smirk. Dent scowled as the Joker only shrugged. "Forgive me, it's a boring story."

"Did they cut you up? Is that how you got those scars?" The Joker slid his eyes over into a sideways glance. "That's a personal question, don't you think?" Dent's lips twisted. "Is that a lie, then?"

The Joker only smirked again, swirled fingers over the mutilated flesh, shrugged, unapologetically. "My scars are real enough, aren't they?"

Dent huffed in annoyance, didn't deem it necessary to argue with such a clear point. "Well, how did you get them, then?"

The Joker shrugged again, turned to him with a sad, weary smile. "You can assume I got drunk with a knife, or you can draw comfort in assuming that somebody did this to me, and that's what sparked my downward spiral into hell.  
Does that make you feel better, Dent?"

Dent shook his head, as the Joker snickered again. "Reasons, reasons, everybody has to have a reason why. Does it make any of this go away?" 


	2. Bridges Burned

Moments. Fragments and ghosts. How well the Joker knew them all, felt them all, remembered them all, throbbing through memories, and blood and scar, all haunting him, all tormenting him, but never, ever giving the blessed solace of a reason  
Reason had little place in his darkest moments, the torment, the shriveled flesh adorning his mouth like a perverse crown he had never, never wanted to wear. And, now he sat, on his little throne, his subjects, the flitting thoughts in his aching head, and his only audience, God and Harvey Dent. The Joker snickered at the thought of what the Almighty must think of him, but inwardly, he trembled. Despite the snarls or the smiles...he did fear the dying. The severing of his existance, by the slender needle delivered with the leathal injection, a far gentle parting than any of the victims that had met their own demise at his bloodied, bloodied hands. Scowling, he looked down,almost annoyed that he couldn't see the blood he felt.  
Curling his fingers, he shuddered, an exagerated movement a dog might make in flinging off water.

Dent only watched the show from the relative haven of the shadows on his own little sliver of concrete. The darkness peeling over his burnt flesh only made him more monsterous as the Joker rose, and started his irritating pacing again. He tucked wrists behind his back, watched as Dent's eyes followed the figiting movements in silence, for long moments, until Dent finally ventured to ask...

"Was that the true story behind your first kill?" The Joker cackled, his mouth twisting into a sardonic splinter, shook his head, rocking with amusement, before he slid downward to Dent's level, gliding over the distance between them with a pantheresque growl of amusement and pain. "No...no..."It was a sniveling dribble of laughter as the Joker shook his head.

"Come on,Harvey. Do you really think that something as depraved as I am would ever have my first kill actually...justified?  
See, that's the trouble with...reason. Every one of the 'good' folk use to sleep soundly at night, thinking if they can find the 'reason' why something happens, or why somebody like me would even do the things I do, it somehow makes it easier"  
The last word was drawled out in a casual purr, as the Joker wagged his fingers in the air. He snorted, tilted his head to peer down at Dent. "You see...the only difference between me" he swept his hand over his chest, then jabbed a thumb outward of the cell, "And them is one minor, minute detail that nobody really likes to deal with it in civilized society. I cater to my depravity. I listen to that nasty little devil on my left shoulder.The sweet, sweet sheep of Gotham don't."

The Joker only gave Dent a smug grin as his eyes took on the gleam of black ice when he saw Dent flinch. Wagging a mocking finger in the air between them, his voice dropped to a velvet, feral breath. "Disregard for human life isn't a sign of madness, Dent. It's indifference, it's depravity, it's sadism, and it's a hell of a lot of fun. But, the one thing that I have never, ever been, is insane. Save the excuse for mental potholes for the answers after they haul me away and you're left here with your own demons. You may find that the demons are the only honest things left."

Dent's breath hitchs in his clenched teeth,his whole body convulsed in one negating, disbelieving jerk away. "I'm not like you." He hissed out, gritting teeth, shaking his head, desperately scraping for any truth to his own frail, frail words.  
Behind him, he felt the Joker's eyes burning like a brand over the back of his sweating, bowed neck, heard the soft snicker of sick amusement, and the slow, mocking roll of the Joker's knuckles against the bars.

"Ya know, you're absolutely right. You're worse." The Joker watched with satisfaction at the disbelieving, horrified glaze in Dent's eyes, that head wagging in desperate denial. "See, Dent." His voice was casual as he leaned back against the bars, spreading elbows in a slouching lounge, "I hurt, kill, pillage, burn,for no reason other than I enjoy it. I take lives, like you, I inflict suffering, like you, but the one thing that I have never, never taken from anybody was their faith."

The Joker nodded in perverse understanding at the bone-deep spasm of grief that wilted over Harvey's face. Softly, he continued, "See, that's what happens, when you're a good guy. Good guys fall down" The Joker's hand arched in a swoop as he made a long, low whistle and a pop as his fist smacked the floor. "And when you hit the bottom, you drag everybody's little beliefs in human goodness and compassion down to the shitheap where things like me come to play. See, being a villian is much less complicated than that. If I kill somebody...I'm almost doing people a favor, because that's what's expected of me.  
Sure, there's weeping and gnashing of teeth, there's a lot of good speeches on how I need to be stopped, blah, blah, the usual." The Joker's eyes slid up to Dent's, and for a moment, his eyes held a suspicious glitter. "But I don't suffer. I don't wallow in guilt, I don't indulge in angst, I'm not...haunted by the screams, I don't feel remorse, or regret. I just...am. Evil? Uhh...yeah. Sadistic and sick? You betcha. But, I'm honest, and in a perverse way, fair, and a hell of a lot less complicated than, say, a certain white knight who did more to corrupt the soul and faith of Gotham than anything I could ever do."

Dent said nothing for the choking sound he made as he pivoted like a trapped animal. He glared at the bars, cocked his head, furious. "Look. I know it's not what you want to hear, but the truth is pretty damn hard to swallow most of the time. Especially when one of the sheep makes the unpleasant discovery that they're the wolf in the wool."

Dent only glared over his shoulder, and spat, "I'm not like you. You're a sadistic clown that kills people for no reason! You nearly wiped out a few thousand people for nothing more than a gamble!"

The Joker's eyebrow arched high, as he only shrugged. "And how is flipping a coin in the air any different? Even I have to admit that it's a coward's kill to absolve myself of the responsibility for the offing if I blame it on a coin toss. What, my two-cent's worth too cheesy a pun for you?" The Joker scowled at Dent's face crumbling in pain. Kneeling beside the trembling, bowed form, the Joker's words slithered in the inches between them. "Don't be so dense, Dent. Lying to yourself won't bring you any forgiveness. You can wash away the blood, but not the scars or the memories. You want to know what ghosts are, Dent?  
They're what you can't forget. You do enough of what I've done...and you'll know they're real."

The Joker's words lingered between them, as Dent stiffened and the Joker only shook his head in amusement, raised a coy eyebrow. "I'd make a damn good head-shrinker, if I could actually stop messing with people's heads to do it. I think I may have missed my calling, what do you think?"

Dent's eyes were narrowed and far-away. He did not answer. The Joker fell silent again, crossed his arms, waiting. Dent finally lost that glazed, lost look in his eyes, as the unfogged blue broke through the surface and he found himself back in the prison cell. The Joker only smirked. "Find any ghosts? Or are your meds wearing off?"

Dent's nostril curled at that remark, as he shook his head, disgusted. "At least I'm not a sadistic freak that's playing head games with a dying man. In case you haven't noticed, this is the last stop before execution."

The Joker gave him an eerie smile, full of mirth, as he tilted his head back and surveyed the walls around him with a mocking spin. "We're on death row? Really? Gee, I never would have guessed that! Hey, Dent, maybe if I see you in hell, you and I can pop popcorn together, hmmm? Get together? Have a casual chat beside the fire?"

There was only bitter, breaking silence as the two men only stared each other down, withering into miserable contemplation when the Joker glanced away to the brick and concrete walls.

"Ya know, I never thought it would all end...here." The Joker muttered with a shrug, as he palmed the cold concrete, and then gave Dent another smirk. Dent's brow furrowed in irritated confusion. "And just where did you think you'd wind up after your crimes? All those murders? Did you expect Gotham to throw you a parade, or what?"

The Joker's smile grew wide and wicked as he raised his fingers, brushed the nails against the tatters of his vest. "Now,that would be sadistic. I mean, seriously...throwing me a parade? Not unless you were in the front, twirling the baton and throwing the roses at my feet." The Joker's words slithered into another cackle at the image as Dent only scowled darkly and took an intense interest at the walls again.

"Oh,I knew it would all end one day. You can only take so much rope before you're hung by it, ya know?" The Joker's shoulders hitched in another musing shrug. "I just never thought that I would die..here. In a cell, done in by Gotham's finest, at long, long last. It's a rather pathetic ending, isn't it? Sort of like a wet firework after the inferno. An afterthought. I don't like it."

Dent raised an eyebrow at the nonchalant hand waved in dismissal. "You're not the least bit concerned about the fact that they're going to kill you?"

The Joker snorted, tapped a finger against his chin, wrinkled his forehead with exaggerated deliberation, before he shook his head. "Nope. I'm just exceedingly angry that they didn't give me a last meal!" Dent looked as if he were going to piss himself at that comment. The Joker stared up at him, scrubbed another hand through his hair, the familiar gesture of frustration,before he huffed and squatted down by Dent.

"Look. I know that I'm going to be killed in a few hours. I know that those...attack dogs are going to come in here,probably pop me across the skull for old time's sake, shackle me, walk me down the hall, strap me down, and send me straight to hell.  
Exactly what is there to be getting worked up about? I'm going to take a dirt nap, go to the Great Perhaps, become one with the worm food, however you want to put it."

Dent only trembled, as he turned his head towards the pane of glass, saw the sliding of darkness overcoming the last slants of golden light. Soon, the cells would be as dark as the absymal sky outside. "How can you be so...nonchalant over death? You mean to tell me that you'll be laughing when they finally..." Dent choked, could not continue. The Joker's scars twisted darker at his mouth as he tilted his head, curiously. "Finally...kill me?" The Joker finished, softly.

The Joker serenely folded his hands, long fingers lacing upward into each other as he leaned back against the wall, and stared at the floor for a long time, before answering. "Laughing? I think I might be giving them the bird, telling them to bury me face down so the world can kiss my ass. Maybe getting a chorus lines going on, too. What do you think,leathers and whips, or heels and feathers?"

Dent shivered in revulsion as the Joker's smile fell away from his face, and he turned to Dent, no mirth, no perverse joy, nothing but a man with a scarred face and a weary slump. "Ya know, there's not too much that stays the same in this world. I've learned the only certainties are death and scars. Neither one of them can be taken away."

" 


End file.
